The Devourer Below

Arkham Horror Series

By: Josh Reynolds, Evan Dicken, Davide Mana, Georgina Kamsika, Thomas Parrott, David Annandale, Cath Lauria, Charlotte Llewelyn-Wells - editor

Narrated by: Jennifer Jill Araya

Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

The city of Arkham falls prey to ghoulish dread in this chilling anthology of action-packed adventure, from the bestselling world of Arkham Horror

Something monstrous has come to Arkham, Massachusetts. There have always been shadows here, but now a new hunger has risen from the depths and threatens those who dwell here. But there are heroes too—people who stand up and fight to stem the tide, even when it costs them everything. Explore eight shocking new tales of occult horror, captivating mystery, and existential fear—from a zealous new heroine to conniving cultists, bootleg whiskey to night terrors, and fiends that crawl from open graves. A nightmare has fallen across Arkham, and it will devour all.

©2021 Fantasy Flight Games (P)2022 Tantor

These interconnected stories are great.

I really enjoyed this story collection, and it reminded me of a set of stories released by Chaosium called "Dark Cults." Each story plays into a larger setting of people working against The Devourer Below, an Arkham baddie called Umordhoth. This serves as an introduction to this particular AHCG campaign complete with playable characters serving as protagonists in the stories. I hear the campaign is frustrating, but this book makes me eager to try it. The narrator is good though her vocalizations of tough males is a bit jarring. Still, she did well and I would say the same of most males voicing the female characters, it would be off-putting either way. However, this is a must listen for Lovecraft and AHCG fans alike.

Ghoulish Arkham Horror Anthology

At this point I have to say that I’m fully committed to Arkham Horror’s books. This is their first anthology, which I’m pretty excited for!

Overall, I thought this was a quality Arkham Horror anthology. Some stories resonated with me more than others, but that’s the nature of anthologies. Reading this will give you a little insight into what the similarly named Arkham Horror campaign will feel like, and from what I can tell as a non-player it does seem to take some of the same story elements and characters while also ultimately doing its own thing.

As a side note, I appreciate how Thomas Parrott’s two stories tied together. “Sins In the Blood” made me really like Joe Diamond, and I wish he would get a standalone investigator novella, though I’m not sure if Fantasy Flight is doing those anymore. I’m a sucker for a protagonist who’s just genuinely a good person, especially in a setting like this. Shoutout to both of his stories, which ended up edging out Joshua Reynold’s story which had previously been my favorite of the bunch.

I do love me some Lovecraft ghouls, so the whole concept was right up my alley. I tend to like any stories that flesh out Mythos monsters and deities and this collection dives into both. The stories range from horror to pulp action, so there’s a little something in here for everyone. If that sounds like something you would enjoy, I would check this book out!

Not all horror stories...

...are of the same quality.
Pretty interesting foundation for the anthology but there's a lot of hit and miss here.
Some stories are interesting even if they aren't necessarily scary. Delving more into the mysteries surrounding the corpse-eating monsters and the demi-god they worship and serve. And being monsters, they don't stereotypically lack for cognition either. They can communicate and have their own motivations, twisted as they are.
But there's also some low-quality stories sprinkled liberally throughout. I suppose written by authors who are inexperienced with writing horror (or dialogue it seemed).
You have more to worry about poorly written characters with equally poor decision making skills than running up against anything that will truly frighten you here but the book was entertaining and the narrator sufficient to the task (for the most part).